November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving (OR! The return of blog all open tabs)

I am thankful for blogs!

Serious Eats: "Here at Serious Eats HQ we have lots to give thanks for: a fantastic, supportive community; the opportunity to share our discoveries with all of you; and the chance to eavesdrop and participate in the most passionate, discerning, and inclusive food conversations on the web."

Talking Points Memo: "We have a president who, whatever his short-comings, at least speaks in full sentences. We avoided another Great Depression. And we've always got Michael Steele to entertain us."

Gothamist: "This Thanksgiving, the CDC has been concerned that the H1N1 virus may spread further, what with holiday-related travel."

Mena Trott's Nested: "I'm raising my daughter, Penelope, and I am constantly wondering how do we (my husband Ben and I) raise a daughter like you. I don't care if she hates math and doesn't do well in school or whatever as long as she has a passion. That's not saying I think you do poorly in school — it's just the traditional measure of success for a kid. I just want her to be passionate about something and put all her love into it..." Posted last week, the Letter to Tavi is a thanks as much as an appreciation.

Jason Kottke's Kottke - Malcolm Gladwell's article about concussions was not the first on the topic, and did not contain a cogent argument of any kind (in fact, it was almost aggressively lacking in sense), but Jason and other bloggers helped bring attention to the issue, and changes are being made. Spoiler alert! This is the Tipping Point's "three rules of epidemics" in action. The hospitals and doctors who made the research possible are mavens - the "information specialists", Gladwell himself is the salesmen - "[salesmen] tend to have an indefinable trait that goes beyond what they say, which makes others want to agree with them", and bloggers like Jason are the connectors: - "the people who 'link us up with the world ... people with a special gift for bringing the world together.' They are 'a handful of people with a truly extraordinary knack [... for] making friends and acquaintances'. [Gladwell] characterizes these individuals as having social networks of over one hundred people."

More Jason: "The most striking feature of the H1N1 flu vaccine manufacturing process is the 1,200,000,000 chicken eggs required to make the 3 billion doses of vaccine that may be required worldwide. There are entire chicken farms in the US and around the world dedicated to producing eggs for the purpose of incubating influenza viruses for use in vaccines. No wonder it takes six months from start to finish. But we'll get to that in a minute."

Anil Dash - For generosity and vision. We should all be thankful in advance for the work he is going to be doing. No pressure. Also, please fix that home studio set-up.

Bill Simmons - for The Book of Basketball. Maybe not 700 pages and three weeks rewarding, but rewarding nonetheless because it's so packed with ideas and energy. Sprawling at times, and meaning no disrespect to Simmons' GOE(1), I think the book might have been tighter had their been four or five editors who were each responsible for a section, and then had to argue for their sections' inclusion in the book (pyramid-style). Even the errata is fun to read. Thanks also to Brian Libby, whose photos of Memorial Coliseum will grace the design of the Simmons' inspired Bob Cousy's Lisp. Also thanks to Brian's commenter michael_1963 for the earnest but still unintentional comedy gold: "Is this your local team Brian?" Yes, Michael, yes it is.

And of course thanks to my Six Apart colleagues, who made much of the above possible in the first place, and perhaps unfortunately have moved mountains so regularly that it's expected as a matter of course.

Welcome!

You've reached the personal blog of David Jacobs. I live in New York City, and I'm eating two hamburgers a week on doctor's orders. When you're done with the front page, you can read the archives.
You can keep up with me elsewhere on my reblog, my vox blog, randomWalks or flickr, and last but not least, my Typepad profile.

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